Research Project Plan

In business, you should never make decisions on the fly. This is true especially for important business decisions that deals with the financial status of the business. Making decisions without proper thought or extensive research is not only costly for the company but also affects the long-term sustainability of the organization. You may also see baseline project plan examples.

Research is important for business organizations, either for profit companies and also for nonprofit organizations. To help you create a research project plan, here are some research project plan examples you can use and download for free.

Research Project Plan Template

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Template for Research Project Plan Example

Simple Research Action Plan Example

Tips in Creating a Research Project Plan

Here are some important tips in creating a research project plan. Take note that a research plan comprises one step in your company achieving profitability and sustainability. When you want to venture into a new business, specifically starting a new project, you first need to do research, and a research project plan helps you identify problems and create solutions for your new project.

1. Choose the right project

First and foremost, you need to choose a project that can help your business attain higher revenues. Never use company resources to fund a research plan for your own personal hobby. This does not benefit the company in any way and will only cause unnecessary losses for your company.

If you are a business owner, discuss possible projects with your management team. Together, you can brainstorm and finalize on the project you are going to pursue. Think of projects that are going to bring in income for your business. This may be an expansion project or a project that ventures into another industry (for example, your business provides laundry services but you want to invest in a fast-food chain).

Remember, choosing a project will not immediately mean that your going to fund it right away. That is why you need to create a research project plan first before you start purchasing materials or begin working on your actual project.

2. Utilize research materials

After a choosing the project to work on, it’s now time to work on the details of the actual research action plan. There are numerous research materials and research procedures you can choose from, but choosing the right ones will be crucial in the result of the research action plan.

The research materials will depend on the project you chose. Look for research materials that will help you identify problems as well as create solutions for the problems being identified.

Choose established theories and research strategies that can help you in your study. You can find these theories and strategies from hundreds of books, publications, journals, and online resources that are available at your disposal (or at your nearest public library).

3. Establish a timetable

Establishing a timeline will help you create a blueprint for your research action plan. The timetable helps you focus which tasks to prioritize and which tasks to work on later. Additionally, a timetable helps you set a concrete deadline for the research action plan. A timetable gives you additional focus and extra motivation. You may also see comprehensive project plan examples.

Remember that working on a project requires time, and you should not be in a rush to create your research action plan. Depending on the size of the project, the research action plan should amount to at least six months to one year including the data gathering phase, creating the first draft, presenting the plan to the management team, and making the final revisions of the research action plan.

Having a timeline also helps you eliminate last-minute stress in creating the action plan. When you establish a timetable beforehand, you will have more time to research and create a plan that will eventually result to a more well-researched and well-written research action plan.

4. Create a preliminary outline

Together with the timeline, a preliminary outline also gives you a guide on how to create an effective research action plan. Create an outline on what you are going to list down and discuss in the research action plan. To help you create a preliminary outline, list down the main topics that you intend to cover and organize them in a loose order.

To help you keep track of your progress, you can always write your outline in a journal. This way, you can easily revise and add ideas in which you can think can benefit the research action plan. Also in the journal, you can list down questions you think can further develop your research, as well as adding information from the sources you previously gathered. You may also like community project plan examples.

Research Proposal Questionnaire Example

Intro Outline Research Plan Example

Types of Data Gathering Procedures

Here are the types of data gathering procedures you can use for your research project plan. You may use one or a combination from the research gathering procedures listed below. Your research will be dependent on the data or information you gather. A research should never rely on mere assumptions, but data that is both gathered and analyzed.

1. Interview

Conducting an interview is one of the most common yet most effective forms of data gathering. Interviews can either be done in personal or by telephone (smartphone).

There is one rule of thumb when doing interviews: be prepared. You can never obtain quality information if you go into an interview without preparing the questions beforehand or making an outline on how to conduct the actual interview. You will only be embarrassing yourself to the respondent (or the recipient of the interview). You may also like migration project plan examples.

Take note that when making the questions for the interview, the questions should be focused, clear, and should encourage open-ended responses. Depending on the nature of your interview, you should get the most out of your respondents. Even if the questions are answerable by a phrase or a sentence, it should still encourage multiple answers from your respondents. You may also check out agile project plan examples.

2. Questionnaire

Handing out general questionnaires is also another popular and effective data gathering procedure. Compared to interviews, questionnaires are less formal since they are just given to the respondents and the researcher would just wait for the respondent to finish answering the questionnaires. Also, there is no pressure when the respondent answers the questionnaire compared to being interviewed face-to-face.

Sometimes in an interview, the interviewer asks a certain question and follows it up with another question, making the respondent uneasy in answering the question instead. The respondent may not be able to answer the question in the manner that he intended to be since he was pressured by the interviewer to answer a specific type of answer which will be preferred to his study. You might be interested in quality project plan examples.

Compared to open-ended answers from respondents in an interview, questionnaire or general survey results are easier to compile and analyze. Additionally, questionnaire responses can be analyzed with quantitative methods by assigning numerical values to Likert-type scales.

3. Observations

Observation meanwhile pertains to the researcher obtaining data by doing observations to a group of respondents. Observations allow researchers to study dynamics of a situation, frequency counts of target behaviors, or other behaviors as indicated by needs of the evaluation. You may also see marketing project plan examples.

Observations are specifically effective in obtaining information about a particular group and can also produce qualitative (e.g., narrative data) and quantitative data (e.g., frequency counts, mean length of interactions, and instructional time). You may also like what is a project management plan?

Observations, together with focus groups (as discussed below) are less used compared to interviews and questionnaires/surveys.

4. Focus Groups

Focus groups are similar to observations, but focused groups are conducted by groups instead of individuals. The aim of a focus group-type of data gathering procedure is to obtain information about combined perspectives and opinions. The responses meanwhile are often coded into categories and analyzed thematically. You may also check out nonprofit project plan examples.

5. Documents and Records

General Documents and records meanwhile pertain to the researcher basically gathering and examining data gathered from numerous sources (e.g., books, publications, novels, online sources). This type of data gathering procedure does not focus on the respondents but on the other information and analysis formulated in the research action plan.

Books and online references are not the only sources the researcher can obtain data, as he can also gather data from databases, meeting minutes, reports, attendance logs, financial records, and newsletters.

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Sample Research Project Plan Outline

To further help you in creating a research project plan, here is a sample research project plan outline. Take note that the research project plan below is only an outline and does not include comprehensive analysis, which is a requirement for a standard research project plan. You may also see construction project plan examples.

High Energy Sports Store, Inc. – Research Action Plan

1. Introduction

This research action plan aims to identify the possibility of High Energy Sports Store, Inc. opening one new store by the end of 2018 and two new stores by mid 2019. High Energy has been in operations for over three years, with three stores currently in operations. The store is the official authorized reseller of popular athletic shoe brand Nike, Adidas, and Under Armour and also sells various sportswear from the said brands. You may also like quality management plan examples.

2. Statement of the Problem

This research action plan aims to answer the following questions:

• Can High Energy break even from its investment in opening three new stores in a span of one year?
• On what year can High Energy break even and start earning revenues?
• What will be the total cost of High Energy’s investment in the three new stores (including cost of construction of a physical store, purchase of wholesale shoes and sports wear, initial working capital of ten total staff for all three stores?)
• Will the new stores apply a new interior theme or retain the same interior design as the current stores?

3. Methodology

The research will utilize the distribution of survey questionnaires as the main data gathering procedure. The research will involve 100 respondents and the demographic of the respondents are specifically regular customers of the current stores which are currently in operations.

The said survey questionnaires will be given to the customers once they arrive in the stores. If they are not available to fill out the questionnaires, the questionnaires will be sent to their respective email addresses or social media accounts. Before the questionnaires are given out, High Energy will have a master list of the respondents. 

4. Recommendations

*The recommendations will base from the data gathered and analyzed from the respondents, and will also answer the questions as listed in the “Statement of the Problem.”

5. Conclusion

*The conclusion will stem from the recommendations and will also support the findings from the data that was gathered and analyzed.

APA Format Research Plan Example

Doctoral Research Project Plan Example

We hope you found this article to be informative as well as helpful when you will be creating your own research action plan. A research action plan is necessary for the company to avoid jumping right into conclusions when deciding to invest in a new project or venture.

Take note that a research plan comprises one step in your company achieving profitability and sustainability. When you want to venture into a new business, specifically starting a new project, you first need to do research, and a research project plan helps you identify problems and create solutions for your new project.